Diamond Dogs 'reverse' low '07 win-loss record

By: TYLER ESTEP

Posted: 7/3/08

Following a 23-33 season in 2007, Georgia baseball was variably picked to finish fourth or fifth in the SEC East and unranked after coming off the biggest negative swing in wins in the program's history.

The Diamond Dogs promptly reversed that trend, going 45-25-1, winning the SEC, and mounting the biggest positive record swing in over a century of Georgia baseball.

So just how different were 2007 and 2008?

- The Bulldogs started conference play in 2007 by sweeping No. 20 Auburn before being swept by Tennessee. Their first SEC series loss in 2008? Against Florida, in the seventh league series of the season.

- At 20-9-1, Georgia matched its all-time mark for most wins in SEC play (they did it in 2001, too, another College World Series season). The Bulldogs went a dismal 11-19 in 2007.

- As SEC champions, Georgia lost its first two games of the 2008 conference tournament. The Bulldogs didn't even make the trip to Hoover in 2007.

- The Bulldogs had four players drafted in 2007, with two leaving Athens (pitchers Joshua Fields and Stephen Dodson returned). 2008? Six draftees, including a pair of All-Americans (Fields and shortstop Gordon Beckham) and all three weekend starters (Dodson, Nathan Moreau, and Trevor Holder).

Fields and Beckham, a Golden Spikes finalist, were both drafted in the first round, just the second Bulldog tandem to do so (Cris Carpenter and Derek Lilliquist did it in 1987). Fields was the 20th pick, while Beckham went at No. 8.

- Fields' turnaround was a story in itself. After a dismal junior season that saw him post a 1-6 record, 4.46 ERA and six blown saves, he came back for his senior season and returned to his All-American form.

The National Stopper of the Year recorded 18 saves and 63 strikeouts in 37.1 innings while posting a 3.38 ERA.